Journal of Seventeenth-Century Music

Volume 11 (2005) No. 1

David Schulenberg

Editing the Keyboard Music of Bull and Scheidemann

Appendix: The Status of Attributions in MB 14

1 In my article, The Keyboard Works of William Byrd: Some Questions
of Attribution, Chronology, and Style (Musica Disciplina 47
[1993]: 99–121), I offered lists of keyboard pieces that have been attributed
to Byrd either in early sources or by modern scholars, sorted in terms of
the status of the attributions. I do the same here for the works of Bull of
the types published in MB vol. 14, that is, preludes, fantasias and related
works, plainsong settings, and carols. Table 1 lists sources and manuscript
sigla; attributions are divided between safe ones that seem beyond
serious doubt (Table 2) and others whose status is less certain (Table 3).

2 The results here are somewhat different than for Byrd: fewer safe
attributions in Table 2, and a great many more uncertain ones in Table 3.
Moreover, the uncertainties attached to the latter are such that I have not
attempted to distinguish various degrees of probability or improbability among
the uncertain works. This difficult situation arises for several reasons.
There are fewer sources for these works than for Byrd's, and the majority
of the pieces are preserved in just four manuscripts. Two of these, Me and
Vi, are of uncertain provenance, yet they transmit numerous unica whose attributions seem questionable, not only because
of the presence of several conflicting attributions for other works, but,
more importantly, because of the stylistic heterogeneity of the Bull attributions.
A third major source, Bu, transmits most of the works thought to be Bull's
in anonymous copies, although fortunately few of these are unica. The fourth of the major sources, the Fitzwilliam Virginal
Book, is currently undergoing re-evaluation and is no longer considered the
work of the English recusant Francis Tregian, although the status of its attributions
seems secure.

3 What, then, constitutes a fully reliable attribution for Bull? I have accepted
attributions given by Tomkins and Cosyn, two composer-copyists who appear
to have had access to reliable exemplars and who evidently took some care
to preserve attributions. Unfortunately these are few in number. I have also
accepted attributions given in the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, even though
the copyists and provenance of this source must now be considered unknown.
Although this source transmits texts of variable quality, its attributions
are rarely if ever contradicted in other sources, at least for Byrd and Bull.
I have also accepted attributions found in any two extant sources, since no
existing source appears to be copied from another one, suggesting that their
attributions are independent of one another.

4 I have listed all other attributions in Table 3. Clearly the pieces listed
here are of varying degrees of doubtfulness. The main point, however, is that
students of Bulls music risk circular reasoning if they assume any of these
works to be his. I myself have been guilty of that, having previously pointed
out a similarity between one of these and a work for which I named Bull as
a possible composer. (The work in question, the Pavan no. 33a in MB, vol.
27, bears a questionable attribution to Byrd in one source; see The
Keyboard Works of William Byrd, 108.)

5 In a few cases in which the style of a work seems particularly incongruous,
previous commentators have proposed alternate attributions, as noted below.
I share their doubts about Bull's authorship of these pieces, but I consider
many other pieces in Table 3 to be equally doubtful. Barring new discoveries,
these are best regarded as a repertory that was associated with Bulls name.
It doubtless contains compositions by him, but it also contains pieces by
others that passed through his hands, sometimes with modifications, as well
as some that may have had nothing to do with him, other than a perceived commonality
of style.

6 Unfortunately, Table 3 includes every one of the pieces that have been
posited as Bulls work from after his departure for the Continent in 1613.
Brown (p. xxiii) has described a few of these as possible instances of a late
style that Bull adopted after his arrival; the hypothesis of such a
style is necessary if one is to accept the attributions of these pieces, which
differ considerably from the better-attributed ones. But the hypothesis rests
almost entirely on the many unique attributions in Me and Vi, especially those
attached to two rather different types of pieces: several long fantasias resembling
those of Cornet and Sweelinck, and a few liturgical verse settings. Among
the few factors common to both types of works seem to be a focus on fairly
strict imitative counterpoint and an avoidance of the more flashy and mechanical
types of figuration found in what are presumed to be Bulls earlier works,
written before his departure from England in 1613. This is plausible, but
it would require Bull, at the age of about fifty and no doubt under considerable
personal stress, to have undertaken a complete rethinking of his style while
adopting elements of quite different music. It is not impossible, but it would
represent a remarkable and perhaps unparalleled case in music history. In
other instances, such as the two fantasias on subjects from Palestrinas madrigal
Vestiva i colli, a unique attribution
in Me is somewhat more plausible on the basis of apparent echoes of Bulls
earlier style, especially a somewhat facile sort of melodic diminution.

Table 1

Source Sigla

Source sigla are those used in MB. Names in parentheses are those from
which the MB sigla are derived; only in the cases of Co, El, and To are these
confirmed as actual copyists or owners of the manuscripts.

GB-Lbl Additional MS 30485 (Wray; more recently supposed to
be an autograph of Thomas Weelkes)

Table 2

Works with Safe Attributions

This includes all works with attributions to Bull in Tr, To, or Co, or in
any two independent sources.

Sigla are given in italics for anonymous copies. A key, plus a figure
(e.g., d1) is Cunninghams symbol (I have added the figure 1 in
cases for which he gives a letter alone; a letter alone signifies works that
he does not list or to which he assigns no number).

Sigla are given in italics for anonymous copies; in bold for copies with
conflicting attributions. A key, plus a figure (e.g., d1) is Cunninghams
symbol (I have added the figure 1 in cases for which he gives
a letter alone; a letter alone signifies works that he does not list or to
which he assigns no number).